Shifting Sands
by DreadNot
Summary: Death and Alucard discuss business. Slight AxI. Hellsing Discworld crossover. One shot.


_AN: Standard disclaimer applies with the additional mention that this particular version of Death belongs to Terry Pratchett and I'm only borrowing him to visit with characters that belong to Kohta Hirano._

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"EXCUSE ME, I AM LOOKING FOR VLAD DRACULA." 

The Hellsing gate guard gaped at the person on horseback. Later he would be unable to describe the person, nor would he be able to explain to his commander why he had permitted the black robed horseman to pass the gate and enter the grounds. (1) Video cameras didn't help his case; they showed no horseman at all.

Deep in the Hellsing basements, red eyes opened, alert to the sense of death.

The rider dismounted at the front doors and patted his mount affectionately before the great white horse moved to the lawn and began contentedly cropping.

Walter stopped, sensing something awry in the household. As the butler, he could almost feel the ebb and flow of activity among the staff and residents of Hellsing. (2) Their habits were as familiar to him as his own, and something was amiss.

Walter stepped into the entrance hall and his fingers twitched with an urge to draw his wires, but he saw nothing out of the ordinary. Wasn't there always a tall gaunt man in a black robe in the foyer?

He was halfway to the kitchen when he realized what he'd seen and rushed back to the empty entrance hall.

Seras Victoria woke from her dead sleep to a familiar foreboding. She thought about it and realized it was the same sense she'd had in Cheddar – a feeling that death was lurking just around the corner. She hurriedly opened her coffin and climbed out. Grabbing her Walther from its holster on the way out the door, the vampire went to find the source of the premonition.

She frowned at the tall man in the black robe when he passed her in the hall, but ignored him in favor of searching out the reason for her worries. She met a confused and concerned Walter in the entrance hall and together shared the realization that the robed figure did _not_ belong at Hellsing. Walter hurried to seek out and guard Sir Integra; Seras ran back down to the basement to hunt the intruder.

"VLAD DRACULA?"

"I don't use that name."

A bony hand dipped into a deep pocket and withdrew an hourglass. It was made of wrought iron and imperfect glass filled with flaws and bubbles. The sand inside was blood red and despite the fact that it flowed into the bottom of the glass, there never seemed to be less in the top bulb, nor more in the bottom. The figure scrutinized the name plaque on the bottom.

"ALUCARD? AND NOBODY NOTICES THE OBVIOUS…?"

"You of all beings should know that humans don't notice that which they find disturbing." Alucard lounged back in his chair, seemingly unconcerned by the presence of the personification of Death.

At that moment Seras slid around the corner and into Alucard's chambers. "Master! There's an intruder…" She trailed off, staring at the reason for her invasion of her Master's privacy. She glanced back and forth between Alucard and the man in the robes. Just because Alucard seemed unconcerned and even amused was no reason to think the man in black was no threat. Alucard was more likely to be amused by someone bringing him the chance for mayhem than by a long black robe salesman who had somehow gotten lost in the Hellsing basement.

"OF COURSE." Death gave the impression of being mildly chagrined – a noteworthy feat for a being with no facial features.

Alucard waved a negligent hand at Seras. "Death and I are old acquaintances, Police Girl." He waited for her to slowly back out of the room. He could feel her intent to run back upstairs and tell Sir Integra. No matter, one could not tell Death to leave, after all.

"To what do I owe the honor of your visit in person?" Alucard asked. He was curious; in his own way, he supposed he had been serving this being for hundreds of years. He couldn't think of a reason that Death would be there to collect him personally, he was still – well not necessarily _alive _– but he was still animate.

Death returned Alucard's life timer to his pocket and reached in and withdrew a bony handful of tiny black hourglasses. They were all uniform in appearance and none of them had any sand left to flow. "I HAVE FORTY TWO THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED TWENTY SEVEN OF THESE." (3)

Alucard looked at the peculiar objects, trying to understand why that would matter to him. Forty two thousand two hundred twenty seven? Now why was that a familiar number?

Death hmpfed. (4) "YOU HAVE FORTY TWO THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED TWENTY SEVEN SOULS IN YOUR CARE AND YOU CAN'T BE BOTHERED TO KEEP TRACK OF THEM?"

"Oh, those." Alucard shifted in his seat, crossing one leg over the other. "What about them?"

"IT HAS COME TO MY ATTENTION THAT YOU WILL BE RELEASING THEM IN THE NEAR FUTURE. I HAVE COME TO MAKE ARRANGEMENTS FOR AN ORDERLY REAPING."

"I will, will I?" Alucard's stare sharpened. "And would you care to tell me why I will be releasing _my_ slaves?"

"I WOULD NOT." Death does a good implacable and he was doing it then.

Alucard shrugged, "Then I see no reason to be helpful. Any circumstance I can envision in which I would be given the freedom to release my slaves would have to be a hell on earth…" He trailed off on the last words and a manic gleam showed in his eyes.

"THEN YOU'LL ASSIST ME WITH MY ARRANGEMENTS?"

"On one condition."

"YOU WOULD DARE TO BARGAIN WITH DEATH?" Without moving a nonexistent muscle, Death went from merely standing to _looming_.

"Death would dare to come and ask me for my assistance; I will dare to bargain with Death. I will assist you on one condition."

"WHAT IS THE CONDITION?"

Long after Death was gone, Alucard took the object from the table and turned it over and over in his hands. It was an elegant creation of strong lines in steel and glass. It wasn't the hourglass itself that interested him, but rather the sand within it. It didn't matter which way he turned it, the sand still flowed in a single direction, but where the sand had been a pristine white when Death had pulled it from his robe, there was a layer of red sand overlaying the white, resting always on the surface.

Alucard polished the name placard with a gloved finger before putting the lifetimer labeled, "Integral Fairbrook Wingates Hellsing" into his pocket.

(1) The guard, one Lester Palmer, left Hellsing's service soon after, having had one encounter too many with anthropomorphic personifications. He opened a small petting zoo in Birmingham and was shortly thereafter mauled to death by an angry llama.  
(2) A good butler can sense the ebb and flow of the household activities. Walter was a great butler; he could hear the sound of a housemaid nicking pieces of the silver service from the other side of the mansion and through three closed doors. Ask Mabel Chinway. She still screams when she finds loose string on her clothes and _never _ask her to join you in a game of cats cradle.  
(3) I did the math and rounded down quite a bit.  
(4) Actually, this is Death: he HMPFED.


End file.
